BBO – Bridge Base Online 17+

The mechanics and variety of ways to play and watch pros is outstanding. However, it has enough irritating Bridge-specific systemic flaws to be frustrating. It has been close to great for so long and the flaws are not bugs so they don’t get addressed.
First, it tries to make the sampling of hands more interesting for the individual player by making most games based on the player having the best hand, but to keep the bidding competitive, it compensates by including a lot more distributional hands so there is a much greater likelihood of bad splits which frequently penalizes players who understand and play for the higher probabilities of actual random deals.
Second, and more important, there are terrible quirks in the AI bidding. You will frequently feel less like you are playing with an AI partner and more like playing against three AI opponents. It does not handle doubles well, frequently passing takeout doubles or bidding over your penalty doubles. It fails to place your bid into the context of prior bids often attributing outrageous values to a bid despite the hand having previously passed our competing with preemptive bids. It tries to help by describing what each bid is supposed to mean, but you will notice it’s flaws occasionally as it will describe your hand as having completely incompatible holdings such as: 1 or fewer AND 5 or more in the same suit; showing 25+ hcp by a passed hand and other frustrating inconsistencies.

This app was great before they recently added annoying ads that you must scroll through 3 times to get rid of. I only play bridge solitaire but I would have to pay $7.99 for ad free. I don’t play with others or in tournaments which would justify the cost. Why not offer a lower price option for only bridge solitaire? I’ll have to find another app.

Come on when playing tournaments preventing me from continuing and being cancelled from game and after challenges with difficulty removing them